Battle of Chateau Colombieres

The Battle of Chateau Colombieres occurred on 8 June 1944 during Operation Overlord in World War II. A squad of US Army soldiers from the US 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment commanded by Corporal Joseph Hartsock was sent to secure the Chateau Colombieres, a mansion near Hiesville that was to be converted into a medical aid station.

The chateau had been heavily bombed before D-Day, but German resistance in and around the chateau was stiff, with the Germans maintaining machine-gun positions in the area, as well as anti-tank positions outside of the chateau. The American infantrymen were assisted by an M5 Stuart tank, and they succeeded in clearing the chateau of resistance before sweeping the perimeter and eliminating the German soldiers who had taken up positions in the landscape around the mansion. The Americans then proceeded to hold the chateau against a German counterattack, even destroying a tank; Hartsock managed to neutralize the tank crew with a grenade down the tank's hatch. The chateau was secured, and the US Army would use its now-vacant rooms as medical aid stations in preparation for the great push down the causeway towards Carentan.